Fijese que

I might have already written a post about this, but it's been dominating my life lately so I'll talk about it again. It is pretty much impossible to get work done in a community where everyone keeps coming up with excuses not to do anything at all. I realized lately that for every project I do here, I basically have to do all the work myself, when I'm supposed to be working WITH the community. Sometimes I can't even do something myself because I need help from someone else in the form of transport, financial aid, etc., and they say they'll help but every day they say, "Let's do it tomorrow." I've even gotten frustrated and put my foot down, saying, "But you always say tomorrow/next week/etc," and still they find a way to put things off. It's like they're trying to make my life miserable.

A Peace Corps higher-up from Nicaragua is coming to visit my community soon to talk about "non-formal environmental education" -- that is, environmental education that doesn't take place in schools. My boss picked my community for her to come see because we have a youth group and a committee for the wood-saving stove project, which would both be examples of non-formal education if either of them actually organized or did work. My boss knows that neither of these groups are actually functional, but they are possibly the best he's got. I think other environmental education volunteers have the same problems with community organization as I do, since we are assigned to schools and not communities. But it is still impossible to get anything done at the school without the support of outside members of the community, which I do not have, or the support of the principal, which I don't really have either. My principal doesn't outright veto my projects, but he makes it very difficult for me to do anything by never being around and never providing the help he says he will.

So this director from Nicaragua will probably come and no one from my community will come to the meeting, or maybe like two people will and they won't really be able to talk about the projects we've worked on because we've barely been able to do anything. Can't wait!

Hopefully I will feel more positive the next time I write...

Paz y amor.